Changing social values and advances in ecological knowledge determine native seed policy for revegetating range and forest lands. Natural resource managers are shifting from seeding intro duced species for their widespread adaptability to reestablishing native species in order to maintain or restore the genetic and ecological integrity of native ecosystems. Addressing the problems of reestablishing native plants on a site-specific basis has been increasingly recognized as an integral part of ecosystem management of large landscapes. We review the formation and implementation of native seed policy for fire rehabilitation and mining reclamation by the major federal land management agencies in the United States, the Department of Interior's Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and the Department of Agriculture's Forest Service. We then examine native seed policy implementation on specific land revegetation projects over the past 10 years for 4 BLM districts in the state of Nevada. We conclude with an analysis of native seed policy in principle versus practice and suggest implications for future policy review and implementation.

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Since 1988, University of California Cooperative Estension short courses have been offered to 362 California ranchers and interested participants. The purpose was to assist private rangeland owners and managers in planning ranch goals, monitoring ranch operations, and establishing economically feasible and ecologically sustainable grazing management systems. In 1994, an evaluation study of the short courses was conducted to determine if the rancher participants had initiated successful improvements in their ranching and grazing management. A survey questionnaire mailed to all short course participants had a rancher response rate of 49%. Results of the survey indicate that over three-quarters of the ranchers had family operations, most of which were cow-calf operations. Almost 40% of the ranchers earned more than half of their income directly from their ranching operation. As a result of having taken the short courses, ranchers reported that they had improved or protected 14% of the rangeland which they owned or leased. Over half said that they had increased their ranching profits. A majority of respondents had implemented at least one ranching practice presented in the short course. These changes appear to be motivated from ranchers' needs to increase on-ranch profits through enterprise diversification, to cope with regulatory constraints, and to improve land management for future generations on a family ranch.

Using survey data collected as part of a comprehensive reevaluation of the Vale Rangeland Rehabilitation Project in eastern Oregon, this exploratory study examined variation in attitudes of Bureau of Land Management (BLM) employees toward range land environmental conditions. Almost one-half of the BLM employees surveyed believed the loss of streamside vegetation (48%) and streambank erosion (42%) were widespread problems on Vale rangelands. Approximately a quarter of the respondents believed rangeland soil loss (24%) and overgrazing (26%) were problems, while only a tenth believed water pollution (10%) was a problem on many or most areas. A composite scale of these attitudes toward environmental conditions on rangelands was developed and assessed. The composite scale was regressed on respondents' regional affiliation, length of service, and ideological attitudes towards government role in natural resource management. In contrast to findings from studies for USFS employees, attitudes toward range environmental conditions were not determined by regional affYiation or length of service (Z50.05). Rather, BLM employee attitudes toward range environmental conditions were found to vary by the interaction of length of service in the agency and attitude toward government's role in regulating water quality (PeO.05) and managing livestock grazing (PeO.01). As length of service increases, core beliefs, professional norms, or client constituencies may not polarize employee attitudes but rather moderate them over time. The accumulation of environmental knowledge may also tend to influence environmental attitudes so that ideological attitudes may have a weaker effect as time passes and expertise expands.